Editing Neu! (section)

===1971–1975: Main career===
The band name NEU! ("new!") was inspired by the prevalence of the advertising business in Düsseldorf at the time, according to Dinger, who described it as "the strongest word in advertising" and even owned a pro forma advertising agency himself for the purpose of booking studios.<ref name=":0">{{cite web|title = Klaus Dinger interview transcript|url = http://www.thewire.co.uk/in-writing/interviews/klaus-dinger-interview-transcript|website = www.thewire.co.uk|access-date = 2016-02-05|first = Biba|last = Kopf|date = 2001}}</ref> The band's [[Neu! (album)|eponymous first album]] sold just 30,000 records. However, today, it is considered a masterpiece by many, including influential artists such as [[David Bowie]], [[Brian Eno]], [[Iggy Pop]] and [[Thom Yorke]] of [[Radiohead]]. It included the [[Motorik]] benchmark tracks "Hallogallo" and "Negativland" (the band [[Negativland]] took their name from this track), and bizarre "songs" like "Sonderangebot".

Their second album, ''[[Neu! 2]]'', features some of the earliest examples of musical [[remix]]es. The duo, excited about recording another album, decided to expand their horizons by purchasing several new instruments. With the money they had left as an advance from the record company, they could record only half an album's worth of material. The company would not increase their advance because the first album did not sell well enough and the label did not see a reason to further finance what was most likely to become a flop. To rectify the lack of material, the band filled the second side with manipulated versions of their already-released single "Neuschnee"/"Super", playing back each song at different speeds and sometimes warbling the music by messing with the tape machine or placing the record off center on the turntable. The songs "Super 16" and "Super 78" (slowed down and sped up versions of the [[proto-punk]] song "Super," respectively) unwittingly became the theme songs to the 1976 martial arts cult classic ''[[Master of the Flying Guillotine]]'' by [[Jimmy Wang Yu]]. This film was later referenced by [[Quentin Tarantino]] in ''[[Kill Bill Volume 1]]'' by also featuring the track "Super 16".

Dinger and Rother were both very different when left to their own devices, and this led to their final album of the 1970s, ''[[Neu! '75]]'' being two solo half-albums. Side One was Rother's more ambient productions which were similar to the first album, albeit more keyboard-driven. Side Two (particularly the song "Hero") was acknowledged as important influence by many later involved in the United Kingdom's [[Punk rock#United Kingdom|punk rock]] scene, with Dinger's sneering, barely intelligible vocals searing across a distorted [[Motorik]] beat with aggressive single chord guitar pounding.

To aid with performing on the album (and more importantly, live), Hans Lampe and brother Thomas Dinger were enlisted to help execute more music than was possible by two men. Upon its release, and arguably to this day, ''Neu! '75'' is the most diverse record available from the krautrock scene. While this can be seen as a positive point, the differences in musical direction (as well as personal issues) not only isolated the Dinger/Rother duo, it isolated their already small fan base. Neu! broke up after the release of ''Neu! '75''.

Neu! are highly praised in [[Julian Cope]]'s ''[[Krautrocksampler]]'', along with other krautrock artists such as Kraftwerk and [[Can (band)|Can]], and Cope has also written a song called "Michael Rother" which appears on CD2 of the Deluxe edition of the album ''[[Jehovahkill]]''.